Best First Aid Kit for Backpacking & Hiking

I still remember taking my first Wilderness First Aid course from the Red Cross. At the time I thought it was great, it helped me land my first summer camp counselor job.

After I was certified as an EMT and Wilderness EMT, I quickly learned that I knew just enough to be dangerous.

Over time I realized that many hikers I met on the trail didn’t know the first thing about self-care in the woods, let alone basic emergency medical practices.

By far the biggest basic-level mistake hikers are making in first aid care, is not knowing how to use the emergency kit or wilderness survival kit they are carrying.

It’s easy to grab a hiking first aid kit off Amazon, throw it in your backpack, and never double-check what’s in it. 

I’m going to help you learn what to put in your backpacking first aid kit, which med kits are worth your time, and point out a few pro tips you can use in the field.

Let’s get right into picking out the best emergency kits for your hiking backpack!

Note: this article does not replace medical advice – if you have questions and concerns about anything health-related, you should consult your doctor, not read internet articles!

Best Hiking First Aid Kits: Reviewed

I Go Compact First Aid Kit

It’s usually quicker to get started by modifying a pre-made first aid kit. However, you run the risk of not having everything you need. On the other hand, this minimal kit is a balance of prepared and slim.

One of my biggest criticisms of first aid kits is they tend to focus on the highest “piece” count as a selling point. As if having a 1,000-piece emergency kit were somehow helpful.

This mini first aid kit avoids going bananas on items and keeps the price, weight, and size to a minimum – while still covering basic outdoor needs.

I’d ditch the nearly useless carabiner and whistle, as they don’t belong in a med kit.

Everything else has a place. Add some antibiotic ointment and mole foam to supplement the blister treatments, and you’ll be close to ready.

Note that this kit is missing medicines such as ibuprofen and other basic generic drugs. Be sure to add these before hitting the trail.

Best for: a baseline starting kit for hiking that doesn’t go overboard on supplies.

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First Aid Only All-purpose First Aid Kit

If you’d prefer something more robust to take care of your prebuilt medical kit needs on the trail, here you go.

I’m not a fan of big backpacking first aid kits but for groups or a “covers it all” type situation, this is a good starting point. This is a 299-piece all-purpose kit.

No doubt there’s a benefit to having more medical supplies on the trail. Your butt is covered for more eventualities, but where do you draw the line? That’s up to you.

In this kit, you’ll have generic drugs like ibuprofen, aspirin, and non-aspirin tablets. You’ll also get more specialty items like finger splints, emergency blankets, and more.

The reason this kit doesn’t take first place is I think it’s a little too “broad”. The number of times you need a thermometer in the backcountry is rare, and things like emergency aluminized blankets belong more in survival kits than as first aid essentials.

That said, being prepared is never a bad thing and all of these meds, supplies, and tools are useful in certain medical situations. For minor injuries, this should have you covered.

Best for really covering your bases – but be sure to mix and match with personal additions.

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Adventure Medical Sportsman Series Medical Kit

There are a couple of items our last two medical supply kits have left out – to my mind are major oversights for hikers. Fortunately, this one picks up the slack.

Not all of us are wilderness medicine experts, so having a handbook isn’t a bad thing.

In the pressure of an emergency, you might not be able to look at the book, but it’s helpful when you’re sitting around wondering what to do about the weird-looking open wound on your leg.

Irrigation syringes are nice for cleaning wounds or abrasions, and it’s good to see one included here. This is quite the comprehensive kit with contents to stop life-threatening bleeding from animal attacks to mistakes using that camping axe, and waterproof trauma pack to administer CPR, stabilize fractures, and protect against burns.

It’s a happy middle ground between the more minimalist first kit we reviewed and the more comprehensive second one.

I’d mark this as the best kit for educated wilderness medicine practitioners to start with for modification.

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Adventure Medical Kits: Ultralight/Watertight .7 Medical Kit

Whether you’re conquering rapids in your kayak or backpacking in some wet weather then the .7 is a great ultralight medical kit to have in your pack.

The contents of the kit are protected in a tough Dryflex waterproof back with a convenient zipper for quick access.

The seam-sealed silnylon back it stashes in adds extra protection from the elements. Inside you’ve got all you need to dress wounds and prevent infection.

You also get a small amount of meds for muscle pain, inflammation and allergic reactions.

Best For: 1 to 2 people looking for an ultra-lightweight medical kit that will survive exposure to the elements on adventures up to 4 days.

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Adventure Medical Kits- Smart Travel First Aid Kit

This medium-sized kit is perfect for overseas travel or multi-day adventures.

Stomach ailments are one of the most frequent issues travelers experience.

This kit focuses heavily on these with a range of medicines for upset stomachs and rehydration salts to prevent dehydration.

Along with these you also get loads of wound and blister care bandages and antiseptics. Comes with a great guide to wilderness and travel medicine.

Best For: Frequent travelers or multi-day hikers who don’t mind a bit of extra weight

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Adventure Medical Kits Me & My Dog

Best For: Hikers who take their dogs along with them.

This kit allows you to provide first aid to care for your and your dog’s first aid needs.

At just under 2 pounds it’s not the lightest we’ve seen but it’s pretty comprehensive. A good range of meds for you and your furry friend (check with your vet first), the usual wound care items, antibiotics and antiseptics.

It also has some items you don’t normally get in other kits like an emergency blanket, wound irrigation syringe and a cold pack for sprains and strains.

The included guide gives some good tips for canine first aid.

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Tactical Field Trauma Kit

If you want to be able to treat more than stings, bumps, and scrapes then this tactical field trauma kit has you covered.

In addition to your usual bandages and pain meds, you also get a QuickClot sponge (trauma pad) to slow bleeding and some high-quality tools like EMT shears and precision forceps. It also includes bandages and wraps to immobilize and support fractures. 

Best For: Basic trauma treatment – 1-3 day backcountry trips with 1-4 people.

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Ready America- Deluxe 2-Person Survival Kit

In an emergency situation, this is the bag you grab before heading out of your home.

It’s designed as a basic bug-out bag with some key survival items as well as a comprehensive first aid kit.

The 2-person tube tent, survival sleeping bags, and body warmers will get you through the night and the other items will help to set up a basic camp.

It’s not ideal for hiking or camping but great for leaving in the trunk of your car for when you need to leave in a hurry when a storm, fire, or earthquake hits.

Best For: Basic 72-hour bug-out / survival pack and first aid kit for 2 people.

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Comprehensive 326 Piece First Aid Kit

This comprehensive first aid kit is designed to cater for a small business or to put up on your wall at home.

If you’re camping in a large group and don’t mind the 2.8 lb weight, then you’ll be well covered for your next trip. Additionally, it caters to 100 people, so it’s probably overkill for most trips. However, it’s perfect if you’re running a daycare or if you need to be able to effectively treat your staff before medical help arrives.

Best For: Mounting on a wall in your office or home – caters for up to 100 people.

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What Should Be In a First Aid Kit for Hiking?

Learning What to Take

Figuring out what should go in your hiking first aid kit and what should stay at home can be daunting, particularly if you lack experience. I’m going to suggest the best way to actually determine what does in your hiking first aid kit is to get certified.

Reading articles (like this one) and watching YouTube, can only take you so far. Hands-on training builds critical judgment and skills that you’ll lack from other learning sources.

Education can help you determine with clarity what to bring and what to leave behind – and crucially, how to use it.

Wilderness Medicine Certifications

Without a doubt, one of the biggest returns on investment for any outdoor enthusiast is a wilderness medicine course of some kind. You don’t need to be a doctor or even in the medical field – these courses are made for, and made to benefit the “average Joe”.

In order of depth of knowledge, the certifications you’d most likely want to achieve would be:

While there are other levels of training, they’re unnecessary unless you’re an outdoor medical professional.

Most recreational hikers will benefit from the WFA course. It’s inexpensive, takes little time, and teaches practical skills you’re likely to remember – and be able to use – in an emergency. I think anyone hitting the trail regularly should get this training.

If you’re a professional outdoor guide, fishing guide, or another outdoor worker, then you might consider getting your WFR certification. This is a more expensive cert that deep-dives into the details of wilderness medical emergencies and how to treat them. Also, WFR must be maintained every 2 years and requires a financial and time commitment.

If you’re a high-level outdoor guide or working on wilderness search and rescue teams, then a WEMT (or better) certification is needed. This certification is actually higher than what most people need – even most outdoor guides don’t require it. Granted, it can be quite expensive and time-consuming, but the level of education and understanding you gain is truly unmatched.

After you go through a little hands-on training, you’re much more likely to understand what medical tools and supplies are worth having with you, and which ones to leave at home.

The Wilderness Medicine Institute of NOLS and Stonehearth Open Learning Center are the only wilderness medicine schools I am familiar enough with to recommend. Not to mention, these schools are widely accepted as industry leaders by professional outdoor guides.

What Medical Conditions Am I Likely to Encounter?

I’m not going to give you a dissertation on wilderness injuries and illnesses. What I will do, is break it down real quick with info you can use, to choose the right first aid kit for you.

The contents of your first aid kit should be based on what you’re most likely to deal with in the wilderness, right?

Here’s what that looks like:

Illnesses on the trail

As you can see from the chart, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea are the biggest culprits of illness on the trail. Outside of that, the causes are scattered and hard to make sense of. With the exception – maybe – of allergies.

Indeed, what you should take away from this is that your medical kit needs to be able to handle NVD illnesses. Medicines such as Tums or Pepto Bismol are helpful for minor upsets.

When severe NVD sets in, be prepared to deal with dehydration. Powdered electrolyte mix in your med kit isn’t a bad idea.

Unfortunately, NVD often occurs as a result of an infection or illness caused by inadequate trail hygiene and cooking practices. In such cases, it is advisable to discontinue hiking and seek medical attention for a prescription of antibiotics.

Wash your hands often and clean your cooking utensils thoroughly to reduce exposure to NVD illnesses.

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First Aid for Hiking Injuries

Athletic injuries and soft tissue injuries make up almost 80% of all injuries on the trail recorded by this study.

Injuries include sprains and strains, cuts, scrapes, bruises, and blisters. In my experience, – both personally and while guiding backpacking trips – I know this to be true.

Blisters are by far the most common medical problem on the trail. Fortunately, you can use many of the same supplies to deal with blisters as you can for scrapes and minor cuts.

To deal with these problems you’ll want:

This is not, of course, a comprehensive list nor should this list replace proper training.

Unfortunately, burns make up a good number of critical backcountry injuries.

Dealing with them is difficult and requires training, as burns can quickly turn nasty. Large burns are also very difficult to keep clean on the trail and are prone to secondary infection.

The best medicine for wilderness burn injuries is prevention. Make sure your cooking stove and hot water pot are on a stable surface and use a burner stand with a wide base of support so it won’t tip over.

Always operate a backpacking stove by squatting on the balls of your feet and never sit near the stove.

If your stove spills boiling water, then you won’t have enough reaction time to get out of the way in a seated position. You’ll end up with a lapful of boiling water particularly if you’re cooking on a picnic table.

How to Treat Foot Problems on the Trai

Blisters are the most common injury you’re likely to encounter, I think it’s sensible to understand how to treat them.

As hot spots develop, be sure to address them before they become a full-blown blister. You can do this by using Backpacker’s Wool or Mole Foam.

Here’s an in-depth guide to teach you how to treat hot spots, so I won’t go into detail there. When it comes to lancing (popping) blisters, the jury is divided. I would advise against lancing blisters unless their size is causing problems. It’s worth noting that an intact blister is generally quite sterile and resistant to infection.

At some point, the blister will pop, or you’ll choose to lance it.

Lancing it at a predetermined time has the advantage of giving you time to sterilize before and after to minimize infection risks.

When this happens you’ll want to:

1. Wash your hands.
2. Clean the area on and around the blister with a disinfectant wipe and/or soap and water.
   Gently press the fluid out of the blister with a sterile instrument.
3. Apply antibiotic ointment to both the blister and around the site.
4. Cover the blister site with sterile gauze lightly dressed with antibiotic ointment.
5. Tape the gauze in place.
6. Clean and re-dress no less than twice per day.

There are many variations and alterations to this process you can make with some knowledge and education.

See our in-depth guide on blister prevention here.

If the blister site continues to be irritated, then you may get another blister deeper in the skin in the same spot.

Without treatment, these ‘deep’ blisters can be dangerous and hard to treat – consider getting off the trail for a while.

Treating Other Trail Injuries

For athletic injuries such as sprains and strains the old RICE acronym still applies.

RICE stands for:

Knowing when and how to do these things may take some training or knowledge beyond the scope of this article.

For minor cuts, scrapes, and abrasions keeping them clean is usually enough.

I usually carry plenty of gauze and medical tape for covering wounds, as dirt and grime are unavoidable on the trail. Good soap such as Dr. Bronner’s and antibiotic ointment are key as well.

It is beyond the scope of this article to teach you emergency life-saving procedures. These guidelines do not intend to replace medical training and are not comprehensive.

Self Care, Cleanliness, and Hygiene

One of the easiest ways to avoid NVD illnesses, and other trail problems, is to prevent them in the first place.

On top of all that, being on the trail doesn’t give you a free pass to become a vector of disease. Please don’t take pride in being the filthiest hiker around – wash yourself! Keeping clean prevents many illnesses.

Survival Kit vs First Aid Kits

Survival and prepping are popular today, and as hikers, we’re all interested in these skills. In my opinion, survival skills aren’t separate from medical skills, I think they complement one another.

A word of warning though: before taking survival advice from a medical pro, or medical advice from a survival expert – find out their level of training. Many survival hobbyists lack training in wilderness medicine, and many medics may not be the most proficient survival resources.

I treat survival kits and first aid kits as separate topics. Sure, some items from a first aid kit may be helpful for survival, but they are not there for survival use.

Create, maintain, and treat your first aid kit as a medical response tool. In the same way, treat your survival kit as a survival tool – though some items in it may also be useful in wilderness medical applications.

Building the Perfect Hiking First Aid Kit

What should a good first aid kit have?

No matter how hard you try you’ll never get the perfect first aid kit. It just won’t happen. Instead what you should aim to do is be prepared to deal with ‘ordinary’ medical situations.

Focusing on highly improbable events is a problem that plagues hikers, preppers, and survivalists.

In the realm of theoretical possibilities, it is conceivable that one could encounter a scenario where they are simultaneously attacked by a bear, struck by lightning, and contract pneumonia. However, it is important to consider more likely scenarios that should form the basis of our training and resources in the field.

Useful first aid kit contents include:

In addition to these, you’ll include any number of personal preference items. This list is not comprehensive and is not meant to be able to handle all emergency medical situations.

In short, it’s simply covering many of the likely illnesses and injuries you may encounter.

To summarize, these supplies are as good as useless if you have not had proper training in identifying and treating wilderness injuries and illnesses.

Medical Kits for different situations

Your first aid kit must be tailored to you, your situation, and the medical tasks you might encounter.

If you’re in Alaska in December, then you don’t need as much focus on treating stinging, biting, or burrowing insects. Conversely, hiking in Georgia in mid-summer, you won’t need as many cold injury treatment supplies.

To keep your first aid kit from becoming unwieldy, you’ll need to tailor it for the season, location, and situation.

These are all examples of situational medical supplies you may want to consider. Of course, this list is not meant to replace your judgment from proper wilderness medicine training.

Knowing When to Call for Help

One of the most important judgment calls you can make is knowing when to make a call. Whether you’re using a PLB, cell phone, or smoke signals, you need to know when to call for backup.

Today’s wilderness SAR teams are extremely well-trained experts, but they all have families, and coming in to rescue you puts their lives at risk, too. So, how do you know when to make that call?

Generally, you should only use a PLB or rescue distress signal when life or limb is at risk.

In these situations, you may call for rescue knowing full well that it’s time for backup.

When is it not time to call for an evacuation? It’s not when you’re scared of the dark. Nor when you’re beginning to feel mildly ill. When you’re wet, cold, lonely, tired, and upset (but your life is not in danger).

SAR teams are not a shuttle service, but every year new and experienced hikers alike abuse the services provided by SAR teams around the world.

Don’t be afraid to call for rescue if you are in peril, but remember the SAR helicopter team is putting themselves at risk by coming out looking for you.

That said, if you have cell service, then you can call 911. You can communicate with them where you are, what’s happening, how critical it is, and how best to work together to solve the problem.

Make no mistake, calling 911 may still launch a full-scale rescue operation – but sometimes it’s as simple as having the local Sheriff’s office bring an ATV a mile up the trail to help you out safely.

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How do I know if I need ____ item in my first aid kit?

Frankly, the best way to know this is to go get trained. It costs very little to get a WFA certification and you’ll know a lot more when you walk out.

If you don’t have wilderness medicine training, then treat your first aid kit as a hikers injury box, with the common items you use at home. Things like tourniquets, triangle bandages, and advanced medical items are not very good if you don’t know how to use them.

Stick with what you know, and make sure you’re prepared to treat colds, common illnesses, and minor cuts scrapes and bruises. These are all things you’re already used to treating at home.

Where do I get my wilderness medicine training?

NOLS WMI and SOLO are the best schools for getting your wilderness medicine education – in my opinion.

They’re widely regarded as the industry standard. Many guiding companies won’t accept certifications from other schools for their guides.

What do I do if I can’t handle an emergency myself?

Be prepared to signal for rescue in any high-risk remote environment with a PLB. Personal locator beacons are not toys, and they must be registered with the Coast Guard before use.

Once activated, a PLB sends out a signal (by various methods) that launches a rescue operation from the nearest SAR base. Once you hit that PLB button it’s all systems go!

Just remember they’re only to be used in dire emergencies.

Did this article teach me everything I need to know to stay safe in the wilderness?

No. This article is not formal training. Certainly, this is not a comprehensive approach to wilderness first aid kits by any means.

Nothing replaces appropriate training by a wilderness medicine professional.

Advice in this article is meant to supplement training and certification. It’s not trying to define scope of practice, standing orders, or medical protocol in any way.

Final Thoughts

There’s a lot to know about wilderness medicine and that in turn affects the type, size, and scope of your first aid kit. If in doubt, stick with what you know. Extra fancy gadgets are only as good as the user’s training.

If you’re just getting started we’ve outlined the first aid kits that help you get going quickly. Remember to go through them and make sure you can identify, and know how to use, each item in your med kit.

Once you know, research, learn, train with, and master the contents of your first aid kit your confidence and safety on future hiking trips will skyrocket!

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